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Maybe it's just me, but being surrounded by nothing but Chlorine and Slime biomes every game is a bit vexing. I feel like there's room for at least one more "common" biome near the start. A watery biome with the long-predicted Fish creature would probably fit the bill in terms of increasing diversity, but adding too much water could potentially throw off the game balance in terms of entropy; being forced to recycle water and deal with geyser heat is one of the game's major challenges. Having an entire biome full of extra fresh water would make geysers obsolete, and having a water biome with polluted water would just clash with the Slime biome.

So what about salt water as a way to add more water that's not immediately usable?

Rock Salt as a mineral could sublimate when exposed to water, much like Oxylite or Bleach Stone. Purifying Salt Water could return some Salt, and it might be useful for certain cooking recipes. You could even have Rock Salt sculptures that melt when exposed to water, much like the Ice Sculptures we've recently added! Duplicants could also emit Salt Water when they cry, rather than being able to drink their tears immediately.

If that sounds appealing, then how could Salt Water be differentiated from Regular Water?

Option A: Salt could be treated as a "contaminant" that'd show up in the Germs menu. This would ensure that it distributes evenly, rather than having awkward layering of fresh water and salt water, as is the case with clean and polluted water now.

Option B: Salt Water could be a separate, non-mixing fluid so that it can be sorted out with the Water Filter (not Sieve), and have a different, more greenish color. Salt exposed to clean Water would sublimate and transform it into Salt Water.

So, what do you think? Would Salt Water be something you'd want to see in this game, or would you rather keep things simple as they are?

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Having contaminants/multiple gases/mixing was suggested multiple times, usually for things like water vapor, but that's relatively complex, expensive computationally, and somewhat hidden from the player, requiring using the overlay to see properly. This is a high cost, so the reward (in "fun") should also be high. IMO germs are an example of it done badly - whole big system just for two germs that only really affect new players.

One huge problem with ONI is that many new features are added kinda unfinished and bare, criticized for being unfinished, then left unexpanded on. Without a good list of "cool, useful, challenging things to do with salt water", the "Brine update" would end up like Outbreak update. And all the good things about Outbreak update were not related to germs themselves...

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